If you are thinking of hiring a builder to construct a luxury home there are a few things to bear in mind.

Obviously you want a builder who is reputable, but the majority of people cannot afford to have a custom home built, so you may find that you don’t know anyone in your circle of friends who can give you a recommendation.

One tip that should go without saying is to read, but more importantly UNDERSTAND everything in the contract before you sign it.

For instance, many contracts now include a clause stating that any dispute will be decided by binding arbitration. There is nothing wrong with that so long as you understand that if you accept it and anything goes wrong you cannot take the builder to court; you can only go through the process of arbitration.

Some builders will use tricks to keep the contract price down in order to win the contract in the first place. For instance, let us assume that the allowance for light fixtures is somewhere between $1,000 and $1,500 which is fairly standard. In practice, when you start shopping for the fixtures you will often find that the total comes to double that.

In many instances another problem is getting the builder to return to fix any faults. When you are having the house built you simply can’t wait to get the construction workers out of sight; later on you can’t find them with a posse.

Take great care with warranties. Most ten year warranties are limited in what they cover, especially after the second year. In many instances you will find that the house has to virtually fall down on top of you before you can make any claim.

One custom house builder with a good track record is Riverview Custom Homes. One of their major selling points is their warranty and they make a big feature of it. This means that you can be confident that if anything does go wrong they will come back and fix it. Fortunately, this is a rare occurrence because they build to a standard in the first place, but at least their warranty gives you peace of mind.